To The Root

"I think that every instant survived in the walking
And every second of uncertainty, every moment of not knowing
Are the exact key of this tissue I've been carrying inside the skin.
There's how I protect you, you're here inside."

Hasta la raíz (To The Root), Natalia Lafourcade

You're not going to tell her you love her never.

"Hi, Blaise."

What for? She wouldn't understand. She doesn't look at you twice. She don't care about you, not really, not in the way she cares about Draco Malfoy―that fucking idiot. She never gives you that worried looks that Draco gets from her. Despite Draco not being there at the time, you know she is thinking about him.

"Pansy."

Pan for you. You haven't told her you call her Pan in your thoughts. Because is Pansy for everyone (or Parkinson) and you want a name that it's only yours. Although she never acknowledges you have and, in fact, she would never care.

"Daphne is with Theodore," is the only explanation Pansy offers to her presence there. She sits, besides you, painfully close to you. She is carrying a book in her hands, but she doesn't even open it. She's been gone for days. And you know exactly whose fault it is.

Damn, Draco.

"Ah."

You don't say anything else. Daphne is always with Theodore. You'd day they are the perfect couple, only if Daphne wouldn't carry her vanity in such a maddening way across all the Slytherin Common Room and Theodore would't have the mood of a dementor half the time. You guess they love each other, but you can understand their love in the way they understand it. Maybe someday Daphne stop worrying about the outer beauty and realise Theodore doesn't care about it and have never cared.

(Although you suspect she already know it and she don't care being beautiful and simply she uses her beauty to feel more… alive).

"You're not going to say anything?" Pansy asks. She want to make little talk. You notice it. She is bored.

And maybe she doesn't want to think about Draco. She's already tried to get him out of her system and it never works. She always convinces herself that Draco is bad for her, but then he comes back and she accepts him again. She loves him more than she loves herself and that hurts you.

But he loves himself more than he loves her. And what he loves the most is his damn pride. Maybe that's the reason he's never told her I love you. Maybe that's the reason that until fifth or sixth year they didn't become into an official couple. You don't know, not really. But it makes you ashamed.

"Why would I want to talk about Theodore and Daphne?" you ask.

You don't want other name―his name―pop out in the conversation. You don't want to comfort Pansy because her boyfriend―or whatever Draco is―is a supreme idiot.

You'd judge Draco, but you don't know how to do it. Since the very first day this year you suspect why he was bragging―and it seemed stupid to you. Now, more than ever, you are convinced Draco does what he does because of his pride, his honor and all that things that doesn't worth a single knut in the end. Only Nott knows that part of the story and you are still missing the complete puzzle.

Now Dumbledore is dead, Snape is on the loose, with Draco and you are still trying to figure all out.

(And in the meantime you have to comfort Pansy).

"I don't know. Lately we don't talk that much."

You've been avoiding her.

And you know why. The last time she broke up with Draco, just before the Slughorn Christmas stupid party and you were invited to it, you kissed her. A fast kiss, stolen, after you see how she painted her nails.

You've never talked about that. She and you. Both of you went on Christmas holidays and she reconciled with Draco another time.

And now Draco is lost again and you don't want to make a fool of yourself.

(In the end, Theodore is right: Pansy is your drug, doesn't matter how hard it hurts you).

"Blaise," she says when you don't answer, "you think he's okay?"

You shrug. Why she always assume you care about Draco? You don't know how to answer. Lie to her and tell her you're sure he's okay? You aren't so sure about that, about Draco being okay―wherever he is. But you don't care too much about it.

You care about her and that's different.

She gets a little closer to yourself.

You put your arm in her back with a deliberate slow gesture and you feel her trembling. There are days, like this, that you'd give everything to see her smile. There's a long time since you've assumed that no matter what, a part of Pansy will always be inside you. It doesn't matter how much it hurts you, you'll always be there for her and for the broken pieces of her heart. You'll always be there for make her laugh and smile.

(Even though her smile never reaches her eyes)

"I don't know, Pansy, I don't know," is what you choose to answer.

She says nothing, she doesn't move. You stay there and say nothing, too.

You know you wouldn't dare. Not now, at least. You can't. You cannot tell her how you fell about her because it might makes you lose. So, you settle down with that.

I love you, Pansy Parkinson.

Who would think that five word are enormous words?

So, this was a gift for someone who loves Blaise / Pansy. And they are my OTP, so I said why not? There's a mention of another fic of me here, What Pansy Means. The epigraph is a Natalia Lafourcade's song, a Mexican songwriter and singer.

English is not my mother tongue (it's Spanish, Mexican Spanish) so, sometimes, just for fun, my brain gets all wrong and write things in the wrong order. If you find a mistake, feel free to tell me, I'm going to be grateful. Bleh, bleh, bleh.

Andrea Poulain

Original: 15th October, 2015

Translation: 16th May, 2016